Written question asked by John Hayes (Conservative) on Tuesday, 25 July 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 9 October 2006. It was answered by Derek Twigg (Labour) on Monday, 9 October 2006 on behalf of the Ministry of Defence.

Iraq Medal

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence pursuant to the answer of 10 July 2006, Official Report, column 1437W, on the Iraq medal, whether journalists and support staff serving in (a) Iraq and (b) other war zones are eligible for the relevant campaign medal; and what the average time taken to award the medal was.

Answer: Only Ministry of Defence accredited war correspondents who were deployed to Iraq during the period of fighting which took place from March to April 2003 are eligible to receive the MOD Iraq medal. The MOD currently have no other situations world-wide where accredited war correspondents are being deployed.All applications for the MOD Iraq medal are processed, on an individual application basis, by the Ministry of Defence Medal Office which is part of the Armed Forces Personnel Administration Agency. Initially there were delays in issuing the Iraq medal, mainly due to the huge demand for it, but also because this coincided with the integration of the Department's individual service medal offices into one tri-service medal office. Currently, applications for the MOD Iraq medal are generally turned around within a period of six weeks.

Secondary information